Pinchas | The Daily and Festival Offerings

by Rav Barry Kornblau (machzor 1996)

 

          The conclusion of parashat Pinchas (Numbers, chapters 28-29) is known as "parashat temidim u-musafim."  It is the portion of the Torah ("parasha") which details the sacrifices and related offerings made in the Temple on each day ("temidim"), as well as the additional offerings ("musafim") of every Shabbat, New Moon (Rosh Chodesh, or the first day of each month), and holiday (Pesach, Shavuot, Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, Sukkot and Shmini Atzeret).  These "additional" offerings are cumulative.  For example, if Rosh Hashana were to occur on a Shabbat, then the daily offering, the weekly Shabbat offering, the monthly Rosh Chodesh offering (Rosh Hashana is Rosh Chodesh of the month of Tishrei) and the annual Rosh Hashana offering would all be made on that day.

 

          At least some portion of these chapters is featured in the prayers of every single day of the year.  Furthermore, since our sages saw many parallels between the worship of God via sacrifice and the worship of God via prayer (which they termed "worship of the heart"), they established the pattern of Jewish prayer services according to the pattern of the sacrifices of our parasha: the morning prayer ("shacharit") corresponds to the morning installment of the daily sacrifice, while the afternoon prayer ("mincha") corresponds to the afternoon installment.  Additionally, the "musaf" prayers which are said after "shacharit" on Shabbat, Rosh Chodesh and holidays correspond to the additional, "musaf" sacrifices of those days, and even incorporate sections of our parasha directly into the prayers themselves.  Finally, "parashat temidim u-musafim" also forms an essential portion of the Torah reading for every Rosh Chodesh and holiday.  Since this Tuesday, July 22, marked the beginning of the period of the Jewish calendar known as the "Three Weeks" during which we mourn the destruction of the Temple in general and the cessation of the sacrifices of our parasha in particular, it is an especially appropriate time of the year to focus upon these chapters which describe the Temple service and which also form a central part of our religious practice today.

 

          Our passage begins as follows (Numbers 28:1-2):

 

          "God spoke to Moshe and said, 'Command the children of           Israel as follows: 'Let all of you be careful to offer My           sacrifices to Me...'"

 

          Recalling that offerings in the Temple were always made by priests ("kohanim"), these verses immediately present two questions.  First, why is Moshe to instruct "the children of Israel" regarding these sacrifices?  He should be instructing the kohanim who will actually offer them!  The second question concerns the placement of this parasha, and is comprised of two related parts: 2a) Why are these sacrifices included here, towards the end of Numbers?  They do not seem connected to the main plot of Numbers, which generally details the voyage of the Jews in the desert for forty years. 2b) Why are they not included in Leviticus along with the rest of the laws pertaining to kohanim and sacrifices?  In particular, they would have fit nicely into chapter 23 of Leviticus, in parashat Emor.  There, in addition to many other holiday-related commandments such as matza on Pesach or shofar on Rosh Hashana, the Torah first mentions the general obligation to offer most of the sacrifices of our parasha.  Yet for some reason, parashat Emor omits the specifics of our parasha (which categories of animals to bring, how many of each category, which type of sacrifice, etc.) that are needed in order to offer these sacrifices properly.  For example, instead of the imprecise wording of Leviticus 23:8:

 

          "You shall present a [generic] sacrifice to God [for each           of] the seven days [of  Pesach]..."

 

the Torah could have inserted Numbers 28:17-25:

 

          "You shall present a burnt-offering of two young bulls,           one ram, and seven one-year old sheep... and a sin-          offering of one goat... on each of the seven days [of           Pesach]..."

 

and simply omitted chapters 28-29 from Numbers altogether!

 

          Let us answer our questions in reverse order, and begin with the second set of questions.  Sforno (Rabbi Ovadia Sforno, Italy, 1470-1550) (see Leviticus 23:8) provides a simple explanation for part b): Parashat Emor is primarily concerned with teaching us other ideas about the holidays, and only introduces the additional offerings to instruct us in some way about those ideas.  Regarding Pesach and Sukkot, for example, the Torah mentions the musaf offerings to highlight that even the non-festival intermediate days of Pesach (days 2-6) and of Sukkot (days 2-7) retain some of the sanctity of the full-fledged festival days with which these two holidays begin and end.  However, since Shavuot is a one-day holiday without any intermediate days, parashat Emor does not refer to its musaf offering at all; it is mentioned only in parashat Pinchas.

 

          Recalling that parashat Emor (along with the rest of the book of Leviticus) was given within a year of the revelation at Sinai, Ramban (Rabbi Moshe ben Nachman, Spain, 1194-1274) suggests a different answer to part b): the additional offerings are not detailed in parashat Emor because God did not want these sacrifices to be offered in the desert.  Rather, they were to be offered only upon arrival in the land of Israel, many years later.  As proof for his thesis, Ramban notes that the summary verse of parashat Emor decrees that the additional offerings are to be accompanied by wine and meal offerings:

 

          "[All of these holidays are times] when you must present           to God a burnt offering, a meal offering, a sacrifice and           wine libations..." (Leviticus 23:37)

 

Yet, these "side-dishes" of a meal-offering and wine may be offered only in the land of Israel:

 

          "When all of you come into the land [but not before           then!]... and make a sacrifice to God...on your festivals... then the person bringing that offering shall        also offer a meal offering of flour... mixed with oil... as well as a wine libation..." (Numbers 15:1-5)

 

Nonetheless, concludes Ramban, the Jews did make the daily offerings as well as celebrate the non-sacrificial aspects of the holidays detailed in parashat Emor in the desert.

 

          [This view of Ramban's opposes the view of Ibn Ezra (Rabbi Avraham ben Ezra, Spain, 1092-1167) who argues that not even the daily offerings were made in the desert.  (See his commentary on Exodus 29:42).  After all, notes Ibn Ezra, the Jews were wandering in a desolate wilderness where they most certainly could not have found the vast quantities of sheep, wine, oil, and grain that, accumulated over thirty-eight years, the daily offerings would have required.]

 

          Ramban also answers part a) of our second question (i.e., why parashat Pinchas in the book of Numbers is the appropriate location for these sacrifices to be commanded).  Since the additional sacrifices of the festivals are offered only in the land of Israel, they are located appropriately in Chapters 28-29 of our parasha after the allotment of that land in Chapters 26-27 among the generation of individuals who, in a short time, would be obligated to bring those sacrifices in that land.

 

          We now return to our first question: Since the offerings of our parasha are offered by the kohanim, why is our parasha addressed to "the children of Israel" as a whole, and not to the kohanim alone?  The answer is simple: these daily and additional festival offerings are the individual responsibility of every Jew, but are fulfilled by offering one set of sacrifices on behalf of  everyone -- Kohen, Levite, and Israelite alike.  As the Mishna (Shekalim 4:1) explains, these sacrifices are purchased with funds collected from the required contribution of one-half of a Biblical shekel each year, as described at the beginning of parashat Ki-Tissa (Exodus 30:15):

 

          "The rich shall not pay more and the poor shall not pay           less than half a shekel, when giving the contribution to           God so as to atone for all your souls."

 

The Torah emphasizes that this contribution is to be the same for everyone, rich and poor, so that everyone has an equal share in the fulfillment of the commandments pertaining to the nation's communal worship, and so that everyone has an equal share in the atonement that this worship confers upon the nation's members.

 

          Although convenient, a single set of daily sacrifices to atone for everyone nonetheless presents a difficulty.  On the one hand, a person normally must be present at the offering of a sacrifice in order for it to atone for him.  (See, for example, the procedure for an individual's sin-offering as described in Leviticus 4:27-31.)  Yet, as Rambam (Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, Egypt, 1138-1204) notes (Mishneh Torah, Laws of Temple Vessels 6:1), the entire population of the Jewish people simply could not all fit into the Temple courtyard at the time that these communal sacrifices were offered each day!  Moreover, as the Jerusalem Talmud (Ta'anit 4:2) notes, this would not be the only problem:

 

          "R. Yona said: The daily sacrifices are the obligation of           every Jew.  Yet, can it be that everyone must ascend to           Jerusalem every day [in order to be personally present in           the Temple so as to achieve atonement through the           offering of the daily sacrifice there]?  Is it not     written (Exodus 34:23): 'All of your males are required to appear before [God at the Temple] three times per year          [only],' [and not every day]!  Moreover, can it be that       everyone should sit idly for [the entirety of each and]         every day [as the law prohibits one from working on the    day that one's sacrifice is offered]?  Is it not written     (Deuteronomy 11:14): 'You shall gather in your grain...!'         Who would gather in the grain for them [if everyone were   prohibited from working on every day of the year]?"

 

          To resolve these difficulties, the early prophets established a system of "ma'amadot," or sections.  The prophets divided up the nation into twenty four sections, each of which successively sent its finest members to the Temple for one week.  Standing in the Temple courtyard, these individuals would be present as emissaries of the entire nation while the daily and festival sacrifices of our parasha were offered.  The members of that week's particular "ma'amad" also recited special prayers so that God would look upon the nation's offerings with favor.

 

          As R. Yona of the Jerusalem Talmud makes particularly clear, the early prophets' decision to establish the "ma'amadot" reflected the need to strike a balance between conflicting tasks for the Jewish nation.  While the Torah certainly does prescribe daily religious worship for each individual, it also requires the Jewish nation to develop a self-sustaining economy in its homeland: "Who would gather in the grain for them?"  Furthermore, the Torah requires only three pilgrimages to the Temple each year - on Pesach, Shavuot, and Sukkot.  The intense spirituality of holidays must be offset by ordinary days lest the holidays themselves lose their special power to inspire us to a greater vision of God.

 

          Let us expand upon R. Yona's observation regarding the balance between holidays and ordinary days to make one final observation about the structure and content of "parashat temidim u-musafim."  First (verses 28:3-8), the Torah describes the daily offering of two sheep, one in the morning and one in the evening.  This is followed (verses 9-10) by the sacrifice of two additional sheep each Shabbat, offered after the morning installment of the daily sacrifice.  Finally, the additional offerings of each Rosh Chodesh (verses 11-15) and all of the holidays (verses 28:16 - 29:38) are detailed.  These are far more elaborate offerings than those of each day and Shabbat, featuring considerably more animals (anywhere from ten to thirty), more categories of animals (four), and the addition of another type of offering (a sin-offering) to the burnt-offerings of weekdays and Shabbat.

 

          By its presentation of these sacrifices, the Torah may be making a simple symbolic statement about religious life in general.  First and foremost, ensure that every morning and evening, you put in your "two sheep's worth" of sacrifice for God and for others: pray, study some Torah, work to improve your character, and do some kind deeds, to name just a few possibilities.  On Shabbat, do the same but add another "two sheep's worth," and do more of it.  On holidays, go all out and try for something really different to make the most of a special occasion.  Know, however, that your steady offering of "two sheep's worth" each day, considered over an entire year, ultimately far outweighs the less frequent holiday offerings in your religious life.  Holidays are opportunities to make "additional" offerings, and are most meaningful when a solid base of daily offerings is already in place.

 

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